Chapter 214: The Boss

I didn’t quite understand, so I asked him to elaborate.

Qian Deli coughed twice, glanced toward the door, and lowered his voice. “I used to do business and made some friends around here. While we were drinking, I heard them say that in villages nestled against the mountains like this, you have to lock your doors and windows tight once winter hits. No matter what noise you hear at night, you can’t open the door. That’s because the noise likely isn’t made by a person, but most likely some kind of animal.”

I felt a slight sense of relief, beginning to catch his drift. According to Old Qian, there was a high probability that the thing outside was an animal rather than a person. I looked up and met Lu Ayao’s eyes, then looked back at the door that had returned to silence. We both felt a bit more grounded.

“So, Old Qian, what kind of animal do you think is making that noise out there?” He Yu took a step toward the window, trying to peer out through the gaps in the wooden planks.

I grabbed him. “Everyone, stay away from the doors and windows. Who knows how many years these wooden walls have been standing? The wood is definitely rotted. If that noise really was an animal, it must be a large one. We don’t have guns, so all we can do now is pray it loses interest in us.”

“Young Master Gan, do you think the thing knocking on the door just now could be a Man-Bear?” Qian Deli suddenly chimed in.

His words hit a complete blind spot for the three of us. I grew up in the Central Plains and had never even seen a bear. The local zoo finally got two, but they stayed hidden in their cave and refused to show their faces. Lu Ayao was even less likely to know, and while He Yu traveled a lot, he didn’t have the habit of wandering into wild forests in the dead of winter.

Qian Deli immediately explained, “I heard about it while drinking too. They say there’s a story in the north about a ‘Bear Grandmother.’ The story goes that a Man-Bear disguised itself as a grandmother to enter a house and eat children. I heard Man-Bears are incredibly smart. Not only can they mimic a human’s knock and wave, but they can even learn to speak! I also heard that just like weasels, they even worship the moon…”

He Yu quickly cut him off, rubbing his arms. “No, no, stop right there. You’re getting more ridiculous by the second. We asked for a briefing, not a horror story to scare us!”

Just then, I heard a terrifying creak from the wooden wall closest to us. I instinctively took two steps back. In a single second, the wall surface was pushed inward, denting under some immense force.

The surroundings fell deathly silent. No one spoke. I noticed that the indentation was massive, at least two meters high. It was clear that whatever this thing was, it was standing upright as it pushed against the wood. This was too much. Even the most powerful tiger shouldn’t be capable of this.

While I was still processing this, the thing outside struck a second time. Several of the structural logs were pushed inward by a significant margin. We couldn’t just stand there anymore.

“Get your weapons! This thing wants to knock the cabin down!” He Yu cursed loudly. He pulled two freshly sharpened Kukris from his hiking backpack and tossed his Mountain-Cleaving Machete to me.

I caught the blade, but I was momentarily stunned. I couldn’t properly handle a blade longer than my palm, but in such a desperate moment, I couldn’t afford to be picky. Before I could even get into a proper stance, the cabin wall looked ready to burst. Lu Ayao suddenly slapped my shoulder.

“We can’t fight in here. Out the door, now!”

With that, he yanked the door bolt back and was the first to bolt out. He Yu followed close behind. The cold wind rushed in instantly. I stepped into snow that reached my ankles, struggling to maintain my balance and avoid face-planting.

Out of the corner of my eye, I glanced back. Behind the cabin wall, a massive figure was standing upright, shoving the logs into the house. Judging by the shadow, the thing looked eerily similar to a deformed human. It was currently leaning its head over the wood, peering down into the hole it had broken into the cabin.

Lu Ayao and the others had already moved quietly up the slope. I was about to follow when I heard a cry of pain behind me. I looked back to see Old Qian sprawled on the ground, one leg trapped deep in the snow. He was struggling to pull it out, sweat pouring down his face despite the cold, his face a mess of tears and snot.

Without a second thought, I ran back to pull him up.

“Don’t worry about me, Young Master! My life is cheap and worthless. Man-Bears are most sensitive to scent, you need to leave now!” Old Qian said, trembling. The man’s legs had turned to jelly from fear, yet he was still pushing me away, telling me to save myself.

I glanced toward the Man-Bear, hardened my heart, and simply crouched down to grab Qian Deli’s leg. With a violent tug, I hauled his leg out of the snow. We both tumbled back into the drifts. Without even pausing to brush off the snow, we scrambled to support each other and stand up.

When I looked back to check the Man-Bear’s position, my heart sank. The dark shadow was no longer where it had been!

I scanned the surroundings frantically, trying to catch sight of the creature. Old Qian gripped my hand, leaning on my arm to steady himself. “W-what is it, Young Master?”

“The bear is gone!” I said, my eyes darting around. I couldn’t see it anywhere.

Seeing my reaction, Qian Deli started looking too. I immediately gave him a shove forward. “Stop looking! It’s definitely still lurking nearby. We need to get up the slope first!”

The words had barely left my mouth when the roar of a beast echoed from somewhere. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a massive shape lunging at Qian Deli and me from behind. It was moving too fast. I only had time to shove Qian Deli forward while my own momentum carried me backward. The bear’s sharp claws flashed past my eyes.

“Gan Ji!” He Yu shouted, charging down from the slope.

I hadn’t realized there was a steep drop-off right behind my feet. I lost my balance and crashed into the snow. Tucking my arms to protect my head, I tumbled down the slope along with a cascade of snow for two full minutes before finally coming to a stop.

The moment I stopped, I rolled and scrambled to my feet. At the same time, I saw that the enraged brown bear had actually followed me down. It ran faster than I had rolled. By the time I looked up, it was already in front of me. A claw swung directly at my head. I ducked, and the claws slammed heavily into a tree trunk, leaving deep gouges and shaking a shower of snow from the leaves.

I ducked to dodge a strike and tumbled into the snow. Reaching for my lower back, I cursed inwardly. My knife was gone. It must have been flung away when I rolled down the slope. The two-meter-tall beast let out a furious roar at me, its eyes bloodshot, preparing to launch another attack.

Suddenly, a long whip like a silver snake lashed out from thin air, instantly coiling around the Man-Bear’s neck. I looked toward Lu Ayao, who had already run down the slope. His strength was surprisingly immense, and he managed to haul the Man-Bear, which had been fixated on me, half a meter backward.

However, this beast was clearly no pushover. With another roar, it reared up on its hind legs and grabbed the whip around its neck with both paws. Sensing trouble, Lu Ayao hurried to retract the whip. He was fast, but the Man-Bear was faster, gripping the whip and yanking Lu Ayao toward it.

The difference in weight was simply too great. No matter how skilled Lu Ayao was, he couldn’t compete with a two-meter-tall bear. In an instant, he was easily pulled off his feet. Just then, Lu Ayao leaped and kicked off a tree trunk, twisting his body in mid-air with incredible technique. I couldn’t quite see how the whip was constructed, but spikes suddenly pierced the bear’s paws. The whip went slack, and Lu Ayao snapped it back into his hand.

This entire sequence took less than a minute. Seeing that Lu Ayao was a hard nut to crack, the Man-Bear immediately switched targets and lunged at me with its bloody maw wide open.

At the critical moment, the sound of something cutting through the air reached my ears from the dense branches. The next thing I knew, the Man-Bear’s head was only half a meter from mine, but it was now encased in an iron muzzle that had locked firmly around its skull.

Before I could figure out what was happening, a ring of spikes suddenly extended from the bottom of the muzzle, sinking deep into the thick fur. The Man-Bear went wild with pain, thrashing its head frantically in an attempt to shake off the spiked contraption.

I didn’t stick around to watch. I scrambled backward, rolling several times through the snow. As I looked up, a gunshot exploded near my ear. A shotgun slug tore right through the Man-Bear’s head. Blood sprayed out, staining a large patch of white snow crimson. The frenzied beast collapsed into a pool of blood, still wearing the muzzle.

Half-kneeling on the ground, I saw the branches in the woods shake slightly in the distance. Then, a figure leaped down from a tree. The person wore a heavy grey fur cloak, yet their movements were incredibly light and graceful. They landed on the snow almost soundlessly.

Seeing them walk toward the bear’s carcass, I hurriedly warned, “Don’t get too close! Careful, it might not be dead yet!”

The person ignored me, walking over to give the Man-Bear’s corpse a sharp kick before slowly reeling in the suspension wire attached to the muzzle.

“Oh, my young master! Are you alright?” Qian Deli shouted.

I turned around to see He Yu and Qian Deli finally stumbling down the slope. They grabbed me from both sides and helped me up, giving the snow on my clothes a quick brush.

He Yu had clearly seen what just happened. He cupped his fists toward the figure in the distance and called out, “Hero! Thank you truly for the rescue. May I ask your name? Are you a hunter from around here?”

The person didn’t give him so much as a glance. They shook the blood off the muzzle, looked at Lu Ayao standing nearby, and said flatly, “Boss, you certainly made us look hard for you.”